


Rewritten

by Mad Poetess (mpoetess)



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: Character Study, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-17
Updated: 2009-11-17
Packaged: 2017-10-03 04:30:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14196
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mpoetess/pseuds/Mad%20Poetess
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The curve of your <i>what</i> rewrites history?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Rewritten

It's the curve of his hip, when Xander draws up his knees. Not to his chest-- by the time they're that high, Spike's too close, drawn in to stroke the tightened muscles, bend down to touch and lick at the sweet dark places they reveal. But just sitting up, naked, knees half bent as Xander leans his arms on them and watches tv from the bed, then.

Then, as Spike stands across the room and looks at him. The curve of his hip. Lightly tan, with a line, off center, where the inside shadow falls. Dark echo. Twin curves, really, even though he's only seeing one side. They're shaped like the belly of a lute.

Like a lute? How old do you think you are, Spike? Just a century older than him, not three.

But Spike's grandmother-- _William's_ grandmother-- had a lute. She didn't play it; not a popular pastime for a girl of her class anymore, but it was perfectly all right to _have_ it, displayed on a little gold stand in the company sitting room. He used to trace the edge of it in the air when they left him to wander around by himself while they talked about money things he wasn't supposed to understand.

He was barely tall enough to reach the surface of the fussy old table the thing rested on, and wouldn't have touched anyway, had his fingers slapped too many times for touching. But he _wanted_ to. Wanted to run his hand over the smooth curve of the luteback and see if that fragile wood felt as warm under his fingers as it looked, glowing in the curtain-filtered English sun. Wanted to know what it sounded like, with a child's unbroken belief that if he could just touch it, beautiful music would pour out of the strings, even though he hadn't a clue how to play.

Spike could say his thighs are curved like the base of a pear. That's solid and twenty-first century for you. Fruit's timeless. But sometime when Spike wasn't looking, pear-shaped turned into a bad thing, so you'd be thinking he's fat, some black-furred grizzly bear. Nah. Xander's big, but it's muscle beneath a layer of softness, and there's nothing on his body Spike needs him to lose, not counting the clothes.

So no pears, even though for Spike, they mean market Sundays, biting into tart golden skin, always expecting more sharpness inside, only to find the juice so shockingly sweet that it rolls down his chin as he sucks at it, desperate for more.

Yes, he recognizes the irony, thank you.

So... Spike's lover has lute-shaped hips when he bends them up to sit. Same golden swell, almost delicate for all the muscle-- bones beneath the skin break so easy when you walk with Slayers. Same mad childish faith that if he just places his hands there, feels the weight of that warm curve in his palm, the music will come.

Only now, he can. And it does.


End file.
